Phileremos bicornis Brehm

LeCROY, M. A. R. Y., 2003, TYPE SPECIMENS OF BIRDS IN THE AMERICAN MUSEUM OF NATURAL HISTORY. PART 5. PASSERIFORMES: ALAUDIDAE, HIRUNDINIDAE, MOTACILLIDAE, CAMPEPHAGIDAE, PYCNONOTIDAE, IRENIDAE, LANIIDAE, VANGIDAE, BOMBYCILLIDAE, DULIDAE, CINCLIDAE, TROGLODYTIDAE, AND MIMIDAE, Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History 278 (278), pp. 1-156 : 29

Phileremos bicornis Brehm

Phileremos bicornis Brehm, 1842 : cols. 504, 506 (bewohnt den Libanon... und kommt im Winter in die syrischen Ebenen herab). Now Eremophila alpestris bicornis ( Brehm, 1842) . See

Vaurie, 1959: 42, and Cramp, 1988: 210.

LECTOTYPE: AMNH 457703 , ‘‘adult male’’ (resexed as female by Vaurie, 1951c: 489–490), collected in Lebanon, in spring, by Dr. Wilhelm Hemprich and Christian Gottfried Ehrenberg. From the Brehm Collection via the Rothschild Collection.

COMMENTS: This is the only Brehm specimen of this taxon that came to AMNH with the Rothschild Collection, and it was designated the lectotype by Hartert (1918b: 23). However, Hemprich and Ehrenberg collected other specimens, nos. 245–273 in Hemprich’s unpublished list, where they are listed as ‘‘Accentor ? bicornis H.’’ ( Stresemann, 1954b: 175, 1962: 386). While Brehm almost certainly purchased this specimen from Lichtenstein in Berlin, it is probably now impossible to know whether he had others of these specimens in hand when he named this form, based on the Hemprich manuscript name ( Brehm, 1855: 122).

There is no original Hemprich and Ehrenberg label on this specimen. Brehm’s label mentions that the specimen was collected in ‘‘vere’’. Vaurie (1959: 42) gave the date as ‘‘end of June 1824 ’’, but I was unable to trace the source of this more exact date. The correspondence of Hemprich and Ehrenberg indicates that they were in Lebanon between May and August 1824 ( Stresemann, 1954b: 122, 1962).